Sam's Best Understanding of Failure

Sam remembered that the last two times he played racquetball, he had melted into tears. As he played yesterday with joy and determination, the memory clearly shadowed him. Perhaps understanding "failure" is just as important as understanding "success." The following is his unsolicited evolution of thinking around the incident:

After 10 minutes of play: "I think I cried last time because I didn't have my own ball." (The two boys had one ball in play then, not two.)

After 25 minutes of play: "I think I cried before because I didn't really practice."

After 70 minutes of play: "I think I cried back then because I didn't believe I could do it."

Taking My Hat

Trinidad traced his fingers lightly over my face in the dark as the three of us snuggled into the King sized bed for our evening's rest. "Did you feel the love I just sent you?" he asked.

"Yes," I said. "Now I'll send you some." I poised my palm about an inch from his forehead and opened myself to channel universal love into the divine being beside me.

"Did you feel it?" I asked after a few minutes.

"Yes!" he said.

"Many wisdom traditions call this spot the Third Eye because you can see things with it that are not necessarily of the world you can see with your other two eyes."

"Really? Like what?" he asked. I began to describe some possibilities.

"Yes, but, have you seen things, too? I'm asking because I've experienced this, and I want to understand it better!"

I told him my experience and he told me his, ending by telling me that it didn't matter to him whether I believed it or not, because he knew it to be true.

I smiled. "You know, our existence takes place on many levels in this lifetime and our body is a vehicle for sundry aspects of our soul in the world. Many wisdom traditions see certain points of our bodies, called chakras, as a place that we are particularly open to give and receive energy." I paused and could feel his body, tense with excitement, beside mine. "Do you have any idea where they could be?"

"The heart," he said quickly.

"Yes, that's a big one. And one that is recognized to a large degree even in our culture -- think of the hearts that people write all over things to represent love. Do you know any others?"

"There are more?"

"Yes, several, actually," I said.

"Wow! Is one here?" He placed his hand on the top of his head.

"Yes."

"And around my eyes?"

I asked him to point. He moved his hand around both eyes and landed just above and between them. "Yes," I said. "I like how you used your hand to feel."

He smiled broadly, then his face eased into the serious expression of inward searching as he slowly ran his hand down the center of the length of the body and identified every other of the several chakras that are familiar to me. I affirmed his discovery. He switched hands and felt each one again. "Are they in your hands, too?" he asked.

"Yes," I said. Trinidad beamed and hugged me hard over and over, telling me how much he loved me. I held him tight to me and smiled. As I released him, I told him that many of my friends knew much more about chakras and energy movement than I did.

"But let us not ever forget how much you know, yourself, when you are open to hearing it, Trinidad. The same is true for all of us. And your energy, little one, is strong like the wind. Like a very big wind. You will spend your life learning to understand and focus it so that it may bring good and healing to the world. It is an honor to see you witness it now."

He grinned at me so I thought his face would crack open, and then he darted a hand out and stole my hat off my head.

"Got your hat!" he said.

I'm Dreaming of a Used Christmas....

Every value of my own that is embraced by my children fills me with awe and is worth a celebration.

"Mom? Tomorrow can we glue this piece back on the Jumanji game we just unwrapped? It's supposed to go here, see? It just got torn. It was like that when we unwrapped it."

"Sure, honey. Glad you thought of it."

"I'm guessing this came from Goodwill!" says Sam, smiling proudly.

I grin back. "Actually, it came from S--. We guessed you'd like it, so I just wrapped it up."

"We sure do!" they said.

The skateboard top quality and already broken in, the well-loved snare drum, kindly refurbished.... We're not the first, and we may be the last stop for these gifts that Santa brings -- but I doubt it.

Infectious Humor?

Sam got his blood drawn today for a Lyme disease titer so we can rule out that as a possible cause for the bizarre infection he's developed at the site of a tick bite from several months ago. "That was fun," he said as he put on his coat, dropping the jaws of the entire laboratory staff. He'd really enjoyed watching his blood go into the tube and observing the entire blood drawing process.

"You know, sweetheart," I told him as we put on our bike helmets, "many people believe -- and I do, too, sometimes -- that chronic illnesses can have something to do with a part of your life that is not healthy, balanced, or integrated with love. Your doctor reminded me of this today. So, I'm wondering, is there any part of your life that you don't like, anything that could hold you back from healing?"

Sam held my hand as we walked slowly down the long hall. When we got to the end, he turned to face me. "Too much greens," he said. "If I ate more candy, I think I'd be better."

From Trinidad....

A horse smells like it is.

The Lost

Scene: Pizza Parlor indoor playground, birthday party.

One toddler, escorted by an older child, returned to her mother, sobbing. "Some girl pushed her down and pulled her hair." A different child cried from the indoor playground, and his mother jumped up to attend. "Now the girl is riding A--," reported the older child.

"Oh, sometimes pretty mean kids come here," said one mother. "Especially in the afternoon when school's out. We don't come here much. Someone's always getting hurt. There are some mean ones."

I sat another moment by the fire and let this all sink in, giving silent empathy to myself and the toddler crying beside me. I was keenly aware that no "answer" arose in me. I felt worried and sad about the language around "mean" and "nice" I was hearing, sad about the violence that had occured, and still I sat, completely blank beyond emotional resonance. It would be easier, I thought, if my moral structure supported me in taking some stand. A clarity of right and wrong that would tell me just what to do and feel. Not that I wished for it. I just noticed the dizzy, confused feeling I had about not understanding on a deeper level what occured, considering it had affected so many at heart. I wanted to contribute and be clearer about my feelings.

I returned to the indoor playground. A group of children and an adult holding a different sobbing toddler stood in a circle. "She did it," several children said over each other, pointing to a girl at one end. "She keeps pulling at people's arms, hitting them and pinching. She sat on him."

The toddler continued to wail unconsolably. His mother held him and shook her head, appearing at a loss. I took a look at the culprit.

Three feet tall with whispy blonde hair and Coke bottle lenses in her wire-framed glasses, this was not your postcard bully. The child's mouth contorted at the edges. I had the sense that she was separate from the group in more ways than one. This was a child who needed and offered more than was expected in the world. I have worked with "special needs" kids enough to see them from a distance. Despite her inability to connect in a meaningful way, this little girl felt the pain that she thought she had caused.

I crossed the circle and sat beside her. "Hi. I'm guessing that you want a friend, too, is that right?"

She nodded. "You didn't want him to cry, huh?"

"Sad," she said.

"Were you really wanting to play, and when you touched him, he cried?" I asked. She nodded.

I offered more words of empathy and gave some silently as well to both the girl child and the toddler. The little girl declined my offer of a lap, but suddenly lay down beside me, her face against the mat, welcoming my hand upon her back. We sat quietly for awhile. Then she stood up. I offered her an example of how I expected the other children would like to be touched. She took it in with large eyes but no words.

I called a couple of the older children down. Trinidad was one. I explained that the girl had trouble connecting with children with her body, but she really wanted to play and be included. Would they be willing to support her by showing her how they wanted to be touched and by staying with her in the climbing structure (the dang thing is too small for adults) so everyone could be safe in their play? Trinidad made a fierce face at me and said, "No," irritated to be interrupted in his focused play. I assured him that I was not making a demand. He looked relieved and ran off. Two older girls with soft eyes said they would be willing. A crowd of smaller children stood around them and heard my explanation of what I guessed had happened in the violent encounters.

"Everyone learns how to connect with their bodies at some point," I said. "She needs a bit of help just now. It's kind of like playing with a puppy." Two children lit up with understanding. "How do puppies play?" I asked.

"They jump and bite!" said a three-year-old girl, smiling broadly.

"That's right. And it takes awhile for you to show them how you want to be touched and played with. They're just trying to connect."

"Yeah, you're right," said a boy. "And she doesn't listen when my Mom tells her." This, I guessed, was the girl's brother. I asked her name, as it came out quite unintelligible to my ear from her own lips. He said her name was M---.

In agreement and good will, the troupe of children climbed back into the plastic tunnels with M-- in tow. She did not grab or pull, but watched them carefully and stayed close. No more cries sounded.

After a quarter of an hour, a woman entered the play area and called to M--. "She's up here!" replied a girl in our group.

My heart leapt to hear that the children had taken her into their group so much as to speak for her. Partly because I did not feel lost anymore -- the path of empathy is always with purpose. Partly because I could see the gift of love and belonging that this little girl received as she was included in play despite the challenges she offered.

And partly because I remember being a lost little girl with Coke bottle lenses.

Out of the Jungle

"We are connected here," Sam, my five-year-old, tells me, pointing to his belly.

"We are?" I ask. "Because that's the part of me that gave birth to you?"

"Yes," he says. "Our organs are still connected."

"Sometimes I think so, too," I say quietly.

Sam does not want to grow up or for me to grow older. He could hardly bear to be just the "shopkeeper" with me as a "customer" last night when we played a pretend game of Motorboard (fake surfing on sticks on the carpet). In the end, his heart melting at our connection, he asked to play my child.

This morning, all three of us snuggled under the covers and read Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book. It was my first reading. Somehow it did not appear in my childhood canon. As we read the first story, "Mowgli's Brothers," Trinidad and I paused frequently to take in the beauty of the words, the wisdom of the wolf-pack leader, Akela, and the depth of tragedy in the plight of Mowgli and Bagheera as they navigated worlds to which they did not entirely belong. This line also caught my attention: "And [Mowgli] grew and grew strong as a boy must grow who does not know that he is learning any lessons, and who has nothing in the world to think of except things to eat." Mmmm.

At the end of the story, my heart splayed open in awe. As I staggered in the prose of a master, I noticed that my tears were not alone. Mowgli finished his speech to the wolf pack, acknowledging his presence as a leader in the hierarchy beyond the jungle, waved the fire before the council to punctuate his point, and then dissolved into tears as the pack departed. I saw a tear trickle from the corner of Trin's eye. It is the first I've witnessed in response to a story. Just as Mowgli's tears were seen by Bagheera the panther as a rite of passage into Manhood for Mowgli (and I am touched by Kipling's sensitivity here, again), Trinidad's tears marked an awareness and understanding of nuance that we have not shared before.

For an hour after, Trinidad and I chased the tragic aliveness of this tale, the title (who were "Mowgli's Brothers," really?), and the choices of Akela, the wolf-pack leader. "It seems to me that in our culture, people are not taught to fight with wisdom, but instead with violence," Trinidad told me.

Sam began to fidget and asked why we kept going on about the beauty of this story. He pulled himself into my lap and began to poke at me, connecting by body our souls. Looking into Trinidad's slate blue eyes across the table, I could see reflected the territory that he and I are now stepping into. With compassion, both of us rested a hand on Sam, knowing he could not understand the connection of minds moving out of the jungle, thoughts beyond the Mother Wolf.

We are Growing.

Going Natural

I sit with the children by the woodstove, gold and red lighting up their faces. A blanket is spread before us with the empty shells of filberts and white paper skins of garlic. They crack nuts to grind into hazelnut butter while I break the last heads of garlic to be planted. We sit for hours talking, cracking, peeling. Bliss.

It is Sunday morning. The flour mill has arrived by mail. We take it apart, wash it lovingly, and begin to grind our first batch of flour. It is an effort. The boys can barely turn the handle while standing on a stool. We are making our traditional Sunday morning breakfast, and we are hungry. The flour is coaxed slowly from the cast iron disks that grind it, 1/4 teaspoon at a time.

We are having fun. We are taking turns. We are severely denting our only kitchen table because I did not remember to cushion the clamp with a cutting board. One hour later, I am the last Mohican at the grind, sweating and turning the crank nearly naked, huffing and puffing. The children are barking at each other and threatening war. It is nearly noon, and I have a few cups of flour ground. "Use the electric thing," says Sam. And I do.

Wednesday night. The soup is made from our own squash and potatoes, carrots and tomatoes. The greens came from the plot where they still grow out back. I am, in mid-December, beginning to get thin on what I can offer our family from the garden. Next year, as every year, I will dedicate more space to winter crops. I believe my family is fed in spirit by eating local.

And there is a price. Year round, the time taken to bring in the leaf mulch, plant, harvest, weed and water is time my children want me at their side. I have hoped that they will grow into the rhythm of farming their own food. I have hoped that the organic shape of this part of our lives would nurture. At times, I mourn that they are often inside playing with the Tamagotchi and calling to me while I work our urban farm. I can't imagine trying to run a full-scale production.

A friend tells me that my children would benefit from a cleaner house. "Keep a distinction between outdoors and in," she tells me, essentially. She is steeped in the Waldorf tradition. There, the fields are represented by puffy green bushes with buff colored wheat, all riding a pink sunrise. The mud does not come in the kitchen door. The leaves do not migrate to the hearth. There is somehow time in this soft pastel landscape for mothers to ground themselves indoors where they remove their dear ones clothing to hang by the fire and serve herbal tea in a spotless kitchen.

It is a beautiful vision. But where is my family in this? Where is the sweat, the conflict, the stretching periodically through the day to consider the needs of all, the exhaustion and the letting go?

My world is not Waldorf portrait material. To be honest, most of us Colliers would rather live in a barn. Perhaps that is an indication of our station in evolution. We ask also for a cozy fire and access to hot water, a good friend to lean on, and food from the garden (no matter how warm), and we will eat it, grow, bicker, doubt, love and be grateful for what is ours.

Longing

"....just waitin' for my ship to come in..." I sang to myself quietly, washing the dishes.

"What's that song you wrote about?" asked my eight-year-old son, Trinidad.

"Oh... it's about longing, about wishing you could have something that always seems to be just out of reach. It's about the frustration I feel in not just sitting with gratitude for what I have. There is so much to be thankful for, and much of it I wanted and received, but still there's this longing! It seems to be part of the human condition, a yearning to touch the universal spirit of Love, and we always try to put it in some earthly pursuit, whether a person or a thing. You know what I mean?"

"Yeah," he said. "Everyone longs for something. And you'll never long for something you already have."

He's got it.

Adventures In Leafdom, Part Two: Finders Keepers

The fun didn't end as O-- rolled away. I gathered my things to go inside for a telephone appointment and to put on a movie for the kids. To my surprise, Trinidad would not have it. He told me that he would be staying outside and working on the leaves while I worked inside on the phone. He had a goal to reach. He agreed to put on the movie for Sam (National Velvet -- now isn't that a warm-your-heart classic?), field any of his questions or needs, and then return to the leaf pile.

Wow. Is this what it's like when they grow up? Amazing. I took him up on it, of course. He was good as gold, except when the kids from next door suddenly came out to play, and Trinidad was distracted enough to join them, pitchfork in hand. I glanced up at one point to see him brandish the fork threateningly (in play) once and had to interrupt my call for a quick reminder that the fork is ONLY to be used on leaves. What a transition point this is for Trinidad -- torn between the world of pretend while in connection with friends and the world of tools and adult-scale meaningful work.

Interestingly, the topic of paid work only came up peripherally, and Trinidad understood that we had made our goal together as a family piece of work, not offered up for payment (very little is, at our house). He only shared his curiosity around what I thought his work might be worth if he did it for someone else. I told him that if he proved a steady focus, I guessed it would be around $5/hour.

As dusk fell, Sam joined us again while we threw everything we had into the last hill of damp leaves. When the Leaf Guy dumped it all the day before, we took note of a glass beer bottle that fell in as well. Sam's fork hit something hard that clinked.

"Oh, there's the bottle," I said.

"I don't think so," he said. He stooped down.

"Maybe it's an aluminum can," I said.

"Nope," he said. "It's a quarter!"

"I'll be darned!" I smiled.

"And another," he said, beaming. And another, and another, and another. Both boys fell to digging and recovered $6 worth of quarters and a wrapper from a quarter roll. Can you believe it?

"Oh, here's that bottle," I told them, pulling out the brown glass whole.

"Yep, mom. You found that because that's what you expected to find. We expected to find money, so that's what we found."

Then I found the can. Hmm. What does that say for the year I found a steaming dead animal in the leaf pile? Was that back when I thought that moving leaves really stinks?

The boys saved their collection on the porch and continued work until they couldn't contain their excitement and plans for the money (they bought each other Christmas presents that they opened promptly the next day). Both headed inside.

All of this excitement bought me another hour and a half in the leaves by myself after dark. I saw them in the kitchen as I passed with each wheelbarrow load. They asked if they could have a glass of Egg Nog. I agreed, and they very responsibly doled each other out a small cup.

On return trips to the back garden, I noticed the carton still on the table, and glasses still tipping to nearly sated lips. After an hour, I asked if they could put the Nog away. Within minutes, both boys were burning the sugar high, taking turns spinning one another until they fell.

Trinidad returned to the leafpile to use the rest of his sugar on his work while Sam ran around the house bouncing off the walls. Seda came home and spelled me so I could cook dinner. The pile disappeared completely as I set warm plates on the table and everyone gathered round.

Trinidad, looking so adult-like, leaned his cheek on one hand and said how good he felt. And exhausted. I ran a bath with Epsom salts and later rubbed arnica into our wrists. There is nothing to bring a family together like working a common goal.

Adventures In Leafdom, Part One: Stranger in a Strange Land

Two dumptruck loads of leaves in the driveway. Me, wondering as I do each year, how it will all be moved. They are the first of a total of 5-6 loads I will take, clearing two at a time until all of them mulch my garden beds and paths. This year, two neighbors also ordered leaves for me to mulch the beds I've cultivated in their yards. My work cut out for me.

At almost 10:30 a.m., I headed out with a pitchfork and a song. It was almost noon when Sam decided to put on his cowboy boots and come help me. I asked if he thought we could clear half by the end of the day. He made it a goal. Trinidad joined us a bit later and decided that the whole pile should be gone by then. Okay!

Friends arrived to drop off a garlic press we'd left behind shortly after noon. As we chatted for a moment, a black man rode by on his bike. I smiled at him, as I do at all of the neighbors I know and haven't met. He stopped his bike and spun around.

"I haven't ever seen a smile like that!" he said. "I've gotta' talk to you."

"I've got guests at the moment. Can you come back in ten minutes?"

"You bet!" he said, and wheeled away.

Half an hour later, he returned, and Trinidad and I were prepared to give this high energy man some empathy. He told us he'd just been chased out of the DariMart parking lot by the cops who couldn't understand his intense disparity about the economy. They thought he was "attacking."

He told me he needed to buy an RV for $500 or less. I thought to myself that I might know someone who was selling (in wonder at the potential serendipity), but I waited to hear more of his story.

O-- hailed from a big city back east, where he had earned a great deal of money in his work dealing drugs. He'd gotten tired of being shot at and seeing friends and family jailed, so he moved west with his girlfriend and became a Rastifarian. Needing to pay the bills and visit his girlfriend's family, they headed to Oregon where she now lives with her family and their 2 year old son. O just got out of a community college. He is homeless and looking to build trust and find work in our community.

Trinidad went to heat up some leftovers for his lunch while I spoke with him about the friend with a potential leaky RV. I decided to call on it right away, and it did appear to be available. I put phone in O's hand and made an informal introduction.

Something funny happened at that juncture. This civilized but intense young man who had been telling me his heartfelt story with eloquence suddenly shifted into a different persona as he "met" the man who might help him.

"Wha'sup?" he said in a deep voice, head cocked. Pause. (I imagined the man on the other end meeting him with some bewilderment in a proper British accent.)

"This's O--!" said my new friend. Guessing that the RV owner was still confused on his end, I heard O-- repeat his name. At this point, I left them and returned, grinning, to my leaves.

The boys and I continued our work and O-- tried to help after making plans to see the RV within 24 hours. He took our half-filled barrows and dumped them with vigor until we all began making strong requests that he let us fill them, first. He liked to keep things moving.

Before he left, I sang him a song I wrote and called "My White Girl Spiritual." He laughed at the name and listened. As I sang with my heart full on, he turned away and bowed his head in the spirit of my words and tone. It is a song of struggle and repentence, a song of longing and acceptance. I wish I could find a way to put it on the blog. At the end, he said, "Well. Now I didn't think you would do that. You are not your average Wh--" he stopped.

"White girl?" I asked.

"Yeah," he said. "But I knew that when you told me to come back in ten minutes. You are a blessing."

"You are a blessing to me," I said. "It is tragedy to have a gift to give, a song to sing, a smile to share and no one to share them with. Your receiving is a gift to me."

He looked at me long. "White and black," he said.

"We both have to give and receive to build this bridge. I thank you for coming by, neighbor."